LOS ANGELES — Seven members of a Latino street gang were charged with firebombing a public housing complex in East Los Angeles with the goal of driving black residents out of the neighbourhood, a federal indictment says.

In the 25-page federal indictment, unsealed on Thursday, prosecutors charged that in May 2014, members of the Hazard Grande gang punched out the windows of four apartments in the Ramona Gardens housing development in Boyle Heights and threw incendiary devices inside.

Black families, including children, lived in three of the four apartments that were attacked. None of the residents were injured.

“Crimes targeting innocent people based on the colour of their skin are among the most heinous crimes a community can suffer,” Eileen M. Decker, the U.S. attorney for the Central District of California, said in a statement announcing the indictments. “The crime was particularly disturbing since the targets of the criminal conduct included children.”

The 2014 firebombing was similar to an attack in 1992, when the homes of two black families at Ramona Gardens were bombed on the same night. A number of black families left the area soon afterward.

At that time, gang violence plagued Boyle Heights, which for decades has been a predominantly Latino neighbourhood.

Latino gang members have been charged with using intimidation and sometimes murder to clear black residents out of other areas in Los Angeles County as well.

Boyle Heights has been one of the success stories in the city’s campaign against street gangs: the neighbourhood has become more peaceful in recent years and has become more diverse.

But the gangs’ presence is still apparent from the symbols spray painted on local businesses and homes.

The Hazard Grande gang, which has connections to the “Mexican Mafia” prison gang, has about 350 members. And they have undertaken a systematic effort to push black residents out of the area, and particularly out of Ramona Gardens, prosecutors said.

Members of the gang monitored black residents of Ramona Gardens, according to the indictment; they warned black families that they were living in Hazard territory and would be at risk as long as they stayed there.

In early May 2014, gang members met to plan the firebombing, prosecutors said, adding that the plan included punching out windows before throwing the bombs in to “maximize damage.”

The intimidation campaign continued even after the bombing. A few months later, a member of the gang warned a mixed-race family that it, too, would be firebombed if it did not leave.